Coating and filming machine and apparatus



March 23, 1943. E. L. MACK arm.

'COATING AND FILMING MACHINE AND APPARATUS Filed Nov. 13, 1939 4 Sheets-Sheet 1 EdJEYzTPfi'a Earlz Hf M0125! ATTORNEY Match23,'1943. J E, L MACK Em. 2,314,453

' COATING AND EILMING MACHINE AND APPARATUS Filed Nov. 15, 1939 4 Sheets-Sheet 2 II I 45 l'arle if. Manse ATTOiQNE "Ed INfiIETCJZS if my at L 3 COATING AND FILMING MACHI NE AND APPARATUS Filed Nov. 13,1939- 4 Sheets-Sheet 3 INVENTOR. Maura Lfiadf 2x11 4 E 110156 ATTORNEY Mmh'23,1943. g, L M C m 2,314,453

COATING AND FILMING MACHINE AND APPARATUS Filed Nov. 15, .1939 4-Sheet s-Sheet 4 A m um- INVENTOR$ Edward mark" awi'flrle E M0115! ATTORNEY Patented Mar. 23, 1943 COATING AND FILMING MACHINE AND APPARATUS Edward L. Mack, Douglaston, N. Y., and Earle H. Morse, Nutley, N. J., assignors to Reynolds Research Corporation, Richmond, Va., a corporation of Delaware Application November 13, 1939, Serial No. 304,156

1 Claim. (01. 91-43) This invention relates to a new machine and apparatus for applying high viscosity coatings to moving flexible flat sheet base materials, in accordance with the methods described in our U. S. Patent No. 2,175,125 Method for forming film and film coating, issued October 3, 1939.

Heretofore, so far as we are advised, there have been no coating machines available which permits the extrusion of high viscosity filming solutions, the substantial stretching of continuous flat sheets of such solutions while unsupported in order to reduce their thickness, and their application to .continuously moving bands of flexible web material.

Accordingly, it is an object of our invention to provide a machine and apparatus suitable for the extrusion of high viscosity filming solutions in a manner so that a flat sheet of the extruded solutions may -be materially stretched while unsupported, so that the thickness of the sheets is substantially reduced, and so that the stretched material may be applied or coated continuously upon moving bands of flexible material such as paper, aluminum foil, fabrics, or the like.

It is also within the purview of our invention not only to provide a machine as described for coating papers or the like but also to utilize such a machine for the coating of flexible backing ma- .terials with liquid materials which are adherent to the backing materials while wet, but which are not adherent thereto when dry, all in accordance with the disclosure in our above identified method patent.

It is a further object of our invention to provide a horizontally and vertically adjustable extrusion hopper adapted to extrude high viscosity solutions in flat sheet form in such manner that they may be continuously'stretched while unsupported, and preferably tangentially applied continuously to flexible flat sheet backing materials.

It is a further object of our invention to provide such an extrusion and coating machine which includes controls and adjustments per mitting high-speed operation and uniformity of product.

It is a further object of our invention to provide a unique supply system for the high-viscosity filming material so that the same may be supplied to the extrusion hopper head under predetermined constant pressures, variable at will, substantially without pulsations..

The accompanying drawings illustrate a preferred embodiment of one manner in which to be expressly understood that the drawings are for purposes of illustration only and are not to be construed as limiting the invention, but that the scope thereof should be referred to in the appended claim.

In the figures:

Fig. 1 is an assembly view of a coating machine embodying our invention;

Fig. 2 is a detail view of a convention form of a paper unwind device;

Fig. 3 is an enlarged view of the coating device;

Fig. 4 is an end view of the coating device shown in Fig. 3;

Fig. 5 is a cross section taken on the line 5-5 of Fig. 4;

' Fig. 6 is a horizontal section taken on the line 6--6 of Fig. 3;

Fig. 7 is a section taken on the line 'I-l Fig. 6;

Fig. 8 is a section taken on the line 8-8 of Fig. 6;

Fig. 9 is an enlarged section of the extrusion hopper nozzle;

Fig. 10 is a fragmentary view of the resulting product.

The machine includes a paper supply station, or unwind stand, A, a film applicator B, a dry ing chamber C and a rewind D.

The paper supply station is a conventional type of automatic braking unwind stand and includes a framework carrying the paper roll Ill. The paper is fed under roller II, which is movable vertically and is in balance with weight l2, and connected thereto by a cord and pulley mechanism l3. The balance crank mechanism I4 is actuated by the vertical movement of roller H and applies the braking mechanism indicated generally as I5. It will be understood that this conventional automatic braking unwind forms no part of our invention, except in combination with the other machine elements about to be described.

The paper indicated as I6 is lead from station A over appropriate guide rollers to application roller H, which latter is adjustable in a vertical direction through screw and hand wheel I8 in dovetail guide l9.

On a framework 20, there is provided a horizontal guide rail 2| carrying a horizontally adjustable block 22- which is adjustable by means of a hand wheel 23 in either direction entirely across the apparatus. The adjustable block 22 carries an extrusion member or. hopper 24, and

the present invention may be practised but it is the same will normally be rotatably mounted in block 2: as by trunnions as (see Fig. '1). The end portion 26 of one trunnion 25 carries-an outside threaded sleeve 21 by a key indicated as 28. A hand wheel 23 may serve to lock extrusion hopper 24 in the desired position. The other trunnion 25 may be provided with a worm and worm wheel arrangement 25a actuated by hand wheel 2511.

By means of this apparatus, it will be observed that we provide for horizontal and vertical adjustment for the extrusion hopper 24. Extrusion member 24 may include end members 30 (see Fig. 4) to which is fastened a body nozzle section 3| with a central core portion 32 leading to extrusion duct 33. The elongated extrusion opening 34, which is in the form of a knife slit, is defined by plate member 35 which is fixed to body section 3|, and an L shaped adjustable plate member 36, which latter is adjustably mounted upon member 3| by a suitable screw and shim arrangement, indicated as 31, (see Fig.

9), in order that the thickness of the material extruded from member 24 may be definitely regulated. High viscosity liquid, suitable for coating papers or metal foils or other flexible backing material, is utilized with our apparatus, for example, a suitable composition, parts by weight, is as. follows: cellulose acetate 17.1, diethyl phthalate 5.7 and acetone 77.2.

Such a solution, indicated as 38. may be stored in tank 39 and fed therefrom through pipe 40, through filter 4|, pump 42, pressure gauge 43 and thereafter through articulated piping 44 to pipe connections 45 of and members 30 in the extrusion head 24, and thence through channels 34 to the interior of extrusion hopper or nozzle member 24.

An appropriate hand gate valve 46 will be provided before pressure gauge 43, to regulate the pressure of the film supplied to member 24. In order that the solution may be kept circulating and in order to provide constant pressures to extrusion head 24, the pump 42 is so arranged as to supply solutions under more pressure than it is desired, and the surplus pressures, and a certain amount of solution is returned to tank 30 by return pipe 41 which is provided with a pressure gauge 48 and a pressure relief valve 41a: this is in effect a by-pass circulating system.

. After the paper I6 has solution applied to the same,-when upon application roller H the paper is guided by appropriate guide rolls through a counting mechanism indicated as 49 and through adrying mechanism identified generally as 50. If desired, after leaving the drying apparatus, the coated paper may be guided over a large roller as described, through the machine, and the extrusion nozzle head placed adjacent thereto in' the position shown in Fig. 9. The extruded fiat sheet film is attached to the moving paper which is arranged to move faster than the rate of the extrusion of the film thereby effectuating the stretching of the film, while unsupported, between the nozzle member and roller H.

The extruded film, when extruded, may have a thickness of .03" and in certain manufacturing operations we have found that at the point of contact with the paper that the stretched sheet of film will be reduced to a thickness of .002".

It will be recognized that in the apparatus described that there are the following variables:

(1) Speed of paper;

(2) Viscosity of film solution;

(3) Pressure upon film solution;

(4) Width of the orifice opening of the pressure hopper or so called extrusion nozzle;

(5) Distance between the orifice opening and the paper.

Wide latitudes insofar as these factors are concerned are permissive. Viscosities, generally speaking, may preferably range between 10,000- 200,000 centipoises although this range naturally may be varied with pressures, size of the orifice opening, distance of the paper from the orifice opening, speed of the paper, as desired, to include filming operations of much higher and lower viscosities. It is advantageous to use high viscosity solutions because little penetration into paper pores by the high viscosity solution will occur; however, films of much less than 10,000 centipoises and higher than 200,000 centipoises may be successfully used in our invention. Paper or backing material speeds of from 30-150 feet a minute are easily realizable and much higher paper speeds depending upon the other variables involved may be attained.

Generally the pointed nozzle of the pressure hopper 24 will be inclined at an acute angle to the surface of the paper as this reduces air pockets and makes for uniformity of application and as illustrated in Fi 9 the film is led preferably to th paper downwardly tangentially to the circumstance of roller l1. Roller I! may have 5| where a rubber pressure roller indicated as 52 may be utilized to smooth the coated paper before it is wound on rewind roller 53 or alternate rewind roller 54. If desired, the coated base material and its coating may be separated and each material rewound'separately. The entire paper feed is accomplished by motor 55 driving the rewind rollers and pulling paper l6 through the apparatus from the unwind roller.

In operation, the solution will be supplied under pressure to nozzle member 24 which will be moved, by virtue of its horizontal and vertical adjustability, away from roller H. The width of extrusion orifice 34 will be determined by adjustable plate member 36. After the filming solution is extruded in a continuous fiat sheet form, the paper, or flexible fiat sheet to be coated, which has already been threaded over the guide rollers through the entire machine, will be pulled,

a diameter of six inches.

In the machine shown, the knife-like orifice 34 of member 24 may be 13" by .003".

It will be realized that a variety 'of flexible backingmaterials may be coated in our apparatus and, therefore, the term paper" in the appended claim will be understood to include paper and the like, metal foils, fabric materials, etc. It will also be realized that a variety of filming liquids can be utilized including solids which may be heated to give suitabl liquid coating materials, solutions formed from solids and volatile solvents, etc. It will also be understood that certain combinations of elements described in the illustrated embodiment of our invention may b utilized without other combinations of elements or with such combinations of elements in modified form. Therefore, reference to the appended claim should be had to determine the scope of our invention.

We claim:

In a coating machine for coating a fiexibi web of moving flat sheet base material, a vertically and horizontally adjustable extrusion member adapted to extrude high viscosity fiat sheet coating liquid, pump means and valve means associated with said member for supplying a fiow of said liquid to said member. adjustable nozzle means for said extrusion member for regulating the amount 01' said flow. reservoir tank means separated from said extrusion member and adjustable pipe means connecting said tank means and said extrusion member, and an adjustable related power driven roller apparatus of small diameter adapted to tangentially feed a continuous web of flexible base material at a speed greater than the rate of extrusion oi said liquid and in proximity thereto, so that the base material may be coated with said extruded liquid in stretched EDWARD L. MACK. EARLE H. MORSE.

5 condition. 

